A CHESTER couple are hoping their son will soon be released from quarantine near Hong Kong after sitting next to a passenger with swine flu.

Geoff and Janet Davies, of Elizabeth Crescent, Queens Park, said son Jonathan, 39, was ‘perfectly all right’ but stuck in a camp unable to return to Shanghai, China, where he lives and works.

Jonathan, who was brought up in Great Sutton, sat one seat away from a swine flu sufferer on a flight in China and has now been placed in quarantine in a government-run holiday camp near Hong Kong.

The ex-pat, who has two sisters – one of whom lives in Hoole – had no idea he was sitting next to a Mexican man with the virus when he took a China Airlines’ flight from Shanghai to Hong Kong last Thursday.

Jonathan then caught another flight to Hanoi, Vietnam, to spend the May Day weekend with friends.

When he returned on Monday to catch his connecting flight back to Shanghai, he was met by about 10 immigration officials.

“It’s a very bizarre experience, but I wouldn't say what the authorities are doing is wrong,” Jonathan told the BBC.

“The place is quite picturesque but it's not the kind of place I'd normally come to for a holiday. It's more like an odd and unplanned Butlin’s break.”

Before being driven to the government-run Lady MacLehose Holiday Village, in the Sai Kung district, he was dressed in a gown, hat, eye goggles, mask, gloves and shoes.

He arrived to find around 75 other people there for the same reason, some of whom he recognised from the flight.

Jonathan, who works as a finance manager for a branding and design consultancy, was taken to a room for medical checks and declined the offer of anti-viral drug Tamiflu. He is not experiencing flu symptoms.